Selling game to a chiller?

Happy New Year all,

Curious foreigner here, been reading a few of the old books which talk about selling (usually venison) to a chiller, located either by a farming store or sometimes the local pub in a remote area.

Is this still going on in NZ or has deer farming eliminated this practise?

Many in Scotland and other parts of the UKstill sell to butchers/chillers but the price of wild shot venison has fallen dramatically since 2020 so many no longer bother.

Cheers for satisfying my curiosity! :thumbsup:

Still happens but tends to go in boom and bust cycles with venison prices.

It is much more regulated than in the past so most Joe blogs wouldn't bother with jumping threw all the hoops required to sell for human consumption.....even the pet food market is quite regulated.

Think each "kill" has to be pinpointed on GPS for proof not from a 1080 area, the clean areas would be getting fairly small. Also operator has to be licensed for the chiller to accept the carcase.

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Originally Posted by tetawa

Think each "kill" has to be pinpointed on GPS for proof not from a 1080 area, the clean areas would be getting fairly small. Also operator has to be licensed for the chiller to accept the carcase.

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Do they have to attend something like a 'Trained Hunter/Game Meat Hygiene' course?

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Originally Posted by caberslash

Do they have to attend something like a 'Trained Hunter/Game Meat Hygiene' course?

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Out of touch what the actual regulations are at present time, someone on here will be up to date.

I'm a MPI Certified Supplier and can sell to a processor. The requirements aren't to bad, but you must have an operations manual approves with the processor and sit an exam administrated by MPI.

There are currently only a handful of processors taking deer. The prices are still pretty low and the required volume they need is also very low (hence the overal venison price issue in NZ at the moment).

If you are only keen on doing a handful of deer, I would say it's not worth it. But if you have access to hundreds and a machine to shoot them from and a processor to sell too, go for it. As mentioned, it's a boom to bust industry.

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My sons workmate has been burgling the velvet off the stags my son has put in the shared chiller. He calls it "fish and chips" ... takes it to his local shop and the owner must use it to keep the missus happy. LOL.

Every man and his dog did this waay back when wild venison hit $1/lb (1973???). Chillers sprung up everywhere. All for export to Europe and North America. A lot of people made more money than their weekly wage shooting in the weekend and recovering carcass and selling to the local chiller operator. Was a great lark all through the 70s and 80's, but tapered off in the early 90's, and the situation since the early 00's is as described above.

Yeh old man bought his new light blue HT in 1974 with Venny shot around the place.
I sold in the 90’s and 2000’s to two places here in Rotorua but unsure if they’re buying here off old Joe Bloggs sorry.


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Originally Posted by XR500

Every man and his dog did this waay back when wild venison hit $1/lb (1973???). Chillers sprung up everywhere. All for export to Europe and North America. A lot of people made more money than their weekly wage shooting in the weekend and recovering carcass and selling to the local chiller operator. Was a great lark all through the 70s and 80's, but tapered off in the early 90's, and the situation since the early 00's is as described above.

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AAH yes those were the days alright, the last years i can remember selling deer i would get about $100 in the hand for a 40kg hind so must have been about $2.50-$3 a kg , thats neck or head shot. Cant remember if they took tax off that or not.
Has to be a very short carry for me to carry a whole carcass these days thats for sure

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Originally Posted by 30late

Cant remember if they took tax off that or not.

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It was probably like possum skins around the same time - the buyer took the tax off before payment (25% iirc for skins), so the money we received was tax paid.

Think i remember it was the same as possums indeed.


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As usual I find myself living in the wrong decade :oh noes:

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Originally Posted by caberslash

As usual I find myself living in the wrong decade :oh noes:

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There is just so much more that one can sell on todays market place, we only had venison...the Asians (in NZ) today will buy almost anything that they call food...buy an incubator and start creating balut and you will beat hands down anything we ever made from selling venison...really good money selling bush shot velvet heads, mate sold 4 last year for over $1200 (collectively), which is more than he would have got for the bodies.

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Originally Posted by DavidGunn

There is just so much more that one can sell on todays market place, we only had venison...the Asians (in NZ) today will buy almost anything that they call food...buy an incubator and start creating balut and you will beat hands down anything we ever made from selling venison...really good money selling bush shot velvet heads, mate sold 4 last year for over $1200 (collectively), which is more than he would have got for the bodies.

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Yeah, hundred year old eggs. Used to eat them in Viet Nam and Thailand. Not bad once you got over the look.....or just didn't look at it at all :o

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Originally Posted by XR500

Yeah, hundred year old eggs. Used to eat them in Viet Nam and Thailand. Not bad once you got over the look.....or just didn't look at it at all :o

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Aren't cultural differences interesting? Didn't know what Balut was so hit Mr Google. Near lost my breakfast! Guess if I actually tried it I might get over my initial revulsion and get to like it - but maybe not. I don't react well to the idea of eating force fed dog either, or force fed duck liver. Haggis is not that tempting either. Not even too keen on hangi being that I like my meat caremalized to some extent. I wonder what things I eat that cause revulsion in other cultures. Maybe slow BBQ pork shoulder? Lol...

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Originally Posted by DavidGunn

There is just so much more that one can sell on todays market place, we only had venison...the Asians (in NZ) today will buy almost anything that they call food...buy an incubator and start creating balut and you will beat hands down anything we ever made from selling venison...really good money selling bush shot velvet heads, mate sold 4 last year for over $1200 (collectively), which is more than he would have got for the bodies.

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Guessing this is selling round the back of a Chinese medicine shop?

We have a few of those round abouts, might make some inquiries, might help that I speak some broken Mandarin... ;)

back when I was a teenager ,mate n I would head,neck shoot goats,gut them,leaving the pucks in and take into Mananui in car trailer and sell them to chiller,we only got $5-10 per animal,but it was beer money. not long before that we were getting average of $5 for green possum skin average....good coin for a school boy.

shot rabbits for commercial dog tucker twice in my lifetime...did it for job for awhile in Tarras. then again in mackenzie country helping out a mate,the 2nd lot we had to keep temperature senser with us to make sure air temps were low enough so meat didnt spoil...always stayed cool enough with an ice pack and small chilly bin LOL
we would shoot 40-50 then stop and have a gutting session,lay them out to cool and carry on till we had 5-6 lots of bunnies to collect up. we got back to one lot and found them nearly all gone...2 ferrets had stashed them down burrows all around the pile....took Kerry n I ages to get them all back out,always aware Mr ferret could be next body you grabbed...fun times .

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Originally Posted by caberslash

Guessing this is selling round the back of a Chinese medicine shop?

We have a few of those round abouts, might make some inquiries, might help that I speak some broken Mandarin... ;)

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Each ethnic group has a person who deals in the buying of produce, one just needs to make contact with them...if people only knew what that manky billy goat they left to rot in the bush was really worth they would have carried it out...a lot of what we leave in the bush as deer guts is worth good money.

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Originally Posted by DavidGunn

Each ethnic group has a person who deals in the buying of produce, one just needs to make contact with them...if people only knew what that manky billy goat they left to rot in the bush was really worth they would have carried it out...a lot of what we leave in the bush as deer guts is worth good money.

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Very true, your local Nepalese, African or Indian restaurant (if you have one) will do crazy things for wild goat.